Thanks for reading these excerpts of the story that is my life. Comments are appreciated.

Monthly Archives: November 2007

I used to be the treasurer of a newly formed Parent Teacher Association. My son’s high school. The fact that I was treasurer should give you pause. It gave me pause, but they really needed someone. These are the kind of minutes I take at meetings, be forewarned. It’s been long enough since the meeting, I think I can put these out to the world.

I’m trainable enough to have changed all the names.

I was feeling, I don’t know… Bored and oppressed by this group of well intentioned, but totally boring and self-important parents, of whom I am a member. It’s just that I’m a short-timer, since my son is graduating in June. So I was having trouble getting worked up about whether they meet in the south shelter or the north shelter for the annuual welcome picnic. I think there were a dozen emails back and forth about which corner of park so far away as to be nearer to Wisconsin than to St. Paul. Which park got almost no discussion.

Also, I was less than rapt by the discussion of whether the school was going to provide appetizers or cake after graduation. I think it was the comment from the Edina mom that sent me into my own la-la land,

“Well, did we explain to them about how we discussed the time-frame of graduation, and little kids, and why we thought cake and coffee would be enough?”

Yes, it turns out, we had discussed this with them. They didn’t care. Like me. They wanted appetizers and They are the School Administration, so they win. But watching this poor Edina mom’s forehead furrow in puzzlement and concern about the issue was just too much for me.

I started to analyze the people there. No not analyze. Judge. No, critique. Observe. Whatever I was doing, I was looking really busy:

There’s the lovely girl with a fabulous 17 year old body that she is sure is hers for all eternity. She did nothing other than look beautiful and sullen and spoiled. She didn’t deserve my critique. I heard her saying, “Hmmmph. I’m so pretty. My mother bores me. I wish she didn’t flirt with Mister Biskits (highest ranking school official in attendance). Hmmph. Does this shirt make my boobs look good? Of course it does. Everything does. How’s my hair? It makes me want to pout. But first I need to fling it from side to side a little. There. Now I am going to feel sorry for myself. Hmmph”

Then there was the face painting woman whose eyebrows look like she had painted them on herself in an attempt to look surprised all the time, or like she got botox. But judging by her hair, which I thought was wet from the shower, but did not dry over the course of a nice long meeting, so I am now suspecting was greasy… Well it doesn’t jibe with the botox type, so I think they were just painted on. But why so high up? It seems to say,

“Hey! whaddya know? I can’t hear you! But I’d like to be the communications director. Surprised? Me too!”
She is also hard of hearing. I am empathetic, but part of me is really bothered by her hearing loss. I need to think about this. Is it that I think she’s not listening to me, in addition to not hearing me? I don’t know. Probably a way of distancing myself from the possibility of that happening to me. Which it almost surely will. That hearing loss may be one of the reasons she seems mildly autistic to me.
And the lawyer in a very clingy bright pink shirt and a lovely grey suit had beautiful brown eyes once upon a time, before her hair started falling out and distracting me from them. But now her interesting shape, with one breast popping out of her unsupportive bra and the other not, and her interesting big belly with a belt cinched around it? Those things made it almost impossible for me to pay proper attention to her lovely string of pearls. Plus, this particular woman almost always looks really concerned, but speaks with a lack of affect that unnerves me when paired with the aforementioned look of concern. It comes across as,

“I am really worried and tired, yet excited about Valleyfair and the oceans of money we might make. But at the same time, I am confused about it.” While she discusses the fund raiser at Valley Fair.

I have little to say about the woman who came in late with her daughter. I suspect she felt almost as bored and superior as I did. But you never know. Maybe I was giving her too much credit based on her natural hair color, her skinny little ankles, classic pumps and her Land’s End clothes. Her daughter also got points for not dying her light brown, hair-colored hair, even if she absolutely made no secret of her boredom. They both give the vibe of,

“We’re not here to impress you. We’re listening. Our clothes are just revealing enough to let you know we are women. My daughter will flash cleavage, but she will immediately hike up her shirt to cover it. That’s how it’s done. I care so little that I can wear pumps without hose or a tan, my tiny ankles do all the talking.”

The Edina mom, who looks eerily like a character from Deep space 9, (Odo) is probably a really nice person. She dresses impeccably, has lots of makeup on, but it looks not too obvious, except whatever she has done to her eyebrows to make them go away. She always finds a way to work Edina into the conversation, which bugs me just a little. But then again, don’t I always try to work St. Paul into every conversation?

I should cut her slack. She graduated from my high school. Plus it seems like she’d be willing to take one for the team, if by taking one for the team, one meant giving head to Mister Bizkits. Her unabashed adoration and flirting with him totally gives me the creeps. “Ma-aark, are you going to work all night again? be Up all night? You don’t really sleep, do you Mark? You worrrrk all the time, and it is so very sexy. You’d fit right in in Edina.”

Mean, mean mean. And Nathaniel? (the secretary) Well he acts just disgusted enough to get a pass from me on the meanness. He behaves himself, and he’s the only guy most of the time. What could I say, the guy drove me to the last two meetings after I went totally AWOL because I couldn’t find parking two meetings ago.

And he does a great job of seeming to float above it all. Except when he fires off an email to every god damned person on earth, smearing the administration with feces. But I think he’s learned his lesson. He appears to say,

“I’m here. I’m dutiful. I don’t want to make trouble, but could you repeat that? Spell it? I’m not trying to stir things up, but don’t fuck with me because I’m secretly a tightly wound can of whoop-ass.”

And Sarah. Don’t have much bitching to do about her. Her new highlights looked good. I always get the feeling that her eyelashes are stuck to her eyelids. That her eyes are somehow stuck open. Wide open. But she’s good, doesn’t seem full of herself, that buys her lots of mercy.

Rachel. Oh Rachel. What can I say that isn’t too, too mean? Her shoes were cute. Her legs were meaty, and her thighs were white and big. I wish I had that sort of acceptance of my body. I wish I could say,

“these are my legs, these are my thighs, you know you wanted to see more of them, so here they are. I shaved so I could wear this skirt so you could look at the place where my thighs push together when I cross my legs, the tightly smashed space where my thighs cuddle with each other under this flimsy piece of demim. I think I’ll sit across from the only male present in the room.”

I wish I had that confidence, so if I say anything about her, it will be transparent jealousy. Instead of of her great comfort, I say something like,

“These are my thighs. These are my legs. Don’t they make skirts longer than full length? I will shave in the summer, just so when something peeks out, it isn’t hairy in addition to being pale, veiny and flabby. You might love to see it, but only in the dark, and we both know that. I think I’ll sit right along side the only male in the room. Well, until mister Biskits comes in, then I’ll start hiking up my skirt because Republicans are easier to seduce, and it’s fun to make him uncomfortable. ”

It’s good I’m getting out of there, because it’s affecting my mental health. I think I’m going to need therapy to get rid of all these voices in my head.